susiej/reviews

The longer I listened and learned from the Total Transformation Program, the more I began to believe that ineffective parenting causes problem behavior in children. While driving in my car, listening to behavioral therapist James Lehman on the audio CDs explain how to handle Oppositional Defiant Disorder in children, I realized how I had been setting my own kids up to misbehave. The good news is, the program shows you step by step how to stop what you’re doing, so you can reverse the spiral of bad behavior. A big thanks to the Parent Bloggers Network for introducing me to this educational series.

For example; one of my sons has learned that if he throws a REALLY big fit about taking out the garbage, I will still make him take out the garbage; but I probably won’t ask him to do it again. This kid is totally manipulating me; and he knows it. I shudder to think of the example I’m setting for his brothers.

We have heard the advice before: Set clear limits for our children, and let them experience the consequences of their actions. But as parents, we need to be reminded. Sometimes, our children have health, emotional or behavior issues that “they just can’t help,” and we become lax at enforcing the limits and rules we’ve set for everyone else in the family. Soon, this becomes a habit, and kids begin to think, “It’s OK if I don’t have to do my chores when I get home from school, because I’m worn out from the kid who bullied me all day.” Lehman explains that the real world will not compensate our kids for their excuses. It’s up to parents to teach our kids to take responsibility for their own behavior, and to learn to function and lead a productive life with whatever handicaps they may have.

As parents we can feed the monster of giving our kids “special treatment” without realizing that we’re setting our kids up to be defiant.

Can you imagine trying to negotiate yourself out of a speeding ticket when the officer walks up to your car? It doesn’t work; I’ve tried it. But, as Lehman explains, when we let our kids negotiate their way out of what’s expected of them, we’re not being fair to our children. We’re giving our kids a false sense of the way the world works. Life will be especially difficult for our children if we force them to learn the reality of self-responsibility as adults.

The Total Transformation Program starts with an Introduction DVD. This was my least favorite part of the program; some of the acting, I felt was difficult to watch. From there, you start the 7-audio lessons, one per week, that really take you into the meat of the program. Each lesson is presented by Lehman himself. I listened to these in the car; over and over again whenever I needed a pep talk. The CDs include examples, and direct strategies you can implement immediately; and lead you to self examination about the type of language you’re using with your children, and the “type” of parental behavior you need to change.

There is also a 118-page workbook that helps you identify which type of behavior problems you are having. Recognizing and understanding the problem is the first step to recovery, and I am currently doing the workbook four times, one time for each child. Each child is different.

The program demands time, work, and introspection. The price tag for the complete program, is hefty: $327. Still, how much would a year in therapy cost? However, the program is guaranteed to work for you or your money back. You pay only $19.00 for shipping and handling ($25 to Canadian destinations). If, and only if, you decide to keep the Total Transformation Program after the completion of the 30-Day Free Program Trial, the cost is three monthly payments of $109.00.

You can also sign up for the Parental Support Line, which is $1 for the first 30 days, and $29 per month after that. If you want to check out James Lehman and what he has to offer, sign up for his Empowering Parents enewsletter. (Sign up is on the bottom of the page.)

Check out the free trial at The Total Transformation Website. It could easily change your life — as well as the life of your kids.

Filed under: parenting, products, self-help, teen by SusieJ - 2 Comments →

Maybe, deep down inside, the Mama did know, but didn’t want to face the inevitable truth. So tempted, I am, to use her real name, because it is a delicious one, but, I will call her simply, Roxanne. Roxanne was wealthy, by small-town standards. Anything Roxanne wanted, Mama bought for her two daughters. If you had observed them, you would have witnessed an easy-going rapport, that implied that the trio was close. Squabbles were rare, and they all shared the same taste in clothes, jewelry and books. Yet, when I watched Roxanne and her sister unwrap the packages from their latest trip to the mall, I felt sorry for them. The extra money came from the government; Daddy never made it home from the war.

Roxanne was also very popular. Especially with the boys. In true, Romeo and Juliet style, Roxanne fell deeply in love with every Mother’s worst nightmare. The town fighter, the town druggie, and the high-school drop-out. I’ll call him, Rocky. Dates, phone calls and visits were strictly forbidden by Roxanne’s mother. This, of course, made the romance all that more exciting. Love always finds a way, and with Roxanne’s brand new car, she drove to his house every day after school, while her Mom was busy at work. Rocky’s Mother saw Roxanne as an elixir of motivation for her son. Roxanne could “turn him around,” the Mom dreamed. This romance was his ticket.

The after-school visits soon turned to overnight ones. How did Roxanne pull those off, you ask? Simple. She simply told her Mom she was at my house. Roxanne’s mother called our house only one time. Not to check up on her daughter, but to simply ask her where she put the cookie sheet. My Mom answered. “No, Roxanne isn’t here, and I haven’t seen her for months,” my Mom honestly said. Roxanne’s mother laughed on the phone, and said, “Well, you certainly don’t know what your daughter is up to, because Roxanne has been spending quite a bit of time at your house with your daughter.” We had a very small house. Roxanne would have been hard to miss. Roxanne’s Mother had a severe case of “Ostrich Parenting.”

You could have put the book, Mama Rock’s Rules: Ten Lessons for Raising a Houseful of Successful Children, into Roxanne’s Mother’s hands, but you could never make her read it. Yet, this book, would have been the perfect straight-talk-about-parenting-advice that Roxanne’s Mother needed to hear. Practical, down-home advice, yet radical to her, that would have put things back in perspective, and put the Mom, the rule-maker, back in the driver’s seat. Rose Rock raised ten kids, and 17 foster children; and she’s proud of every one of them. Roxanne’s Mom could have benefited from Mama Rock’s advice about the role that family meal times serve in parenting:

Once the kids get a full stomach, things loosen up. They not only eat the beans — they spill the beans. Everything would come out at the table, especially the secrets. The higher the comfort level, the more talk came out.

Looking back now, I rarely remember a family meal around the table at Roxanne’s house. They were one of the few families to have one of the early microwaves. A tool that liberated them to eat whatever they wanted, whenever they wanted, so they could freely graze whenever they felt like it. This seemed to create an aura of “isolationism” in the family. Everyone was “on their own.” The girls relished this independence.

Roxanne’s family’s loosey-goosey family rules lies in direct contrast to Rose Rock’s household. In her book, Rock outlines her formula for teaching kids what’s expected, and how structure and consequences keep kids feeling secure. Tough-love rules, that will, in the long run, make your job as a parent much easier over the long haul; especially through the teen years.

The whole thing with rules is this: it’s all about responsibility. When you make guidelines, it makes life easier, it manages expectations. Don’t wait! Start early and start them young.

Mama Rock does give advice for starting them young, with an eye toward preparing them to make good decisions for the day when they will be without you. When you run downstairs to the laundry room, tell your little ones that you’ll be gone for a few minutes, and you expect them to stay right here and color in this book. When you come back upstairs and they have done that, praise them. With a wide-open view to her own family-table discussions, Rose reveals that life is never easy as a parent, and we are never prepared for what life throws at us.

I had already become a single parent when I moved with three young children to South Caroline from New York after the death of my husband. Those were hard times, even for the little things. I didn’t know cars didn’t come filled with gas until after Julius died.

This book is not a memoir, although the antidotes tell quite a few stories. This is a parenting manual, that teaches you how to be tough with your kids, but still show them your love. The book is full of wisdom, and humor:

I want to share with you one of the most important things I learned in parenting. NEVER ask a yes or no question, especially when it relates to crime and punishment. Don’t say, for instance, “Did you break that cabinet door?” Forget it; you’ll never find out because the answer will always be no. Nobody knows “nuthin’” ever.

If no one comes forward to discuss a mess, Wait a day or two. Then, let your children think you already know what’s going on. Sit down with the suspected culprit over a bowl of ice cream or have some cookies together — nice and casual. Phrase your question like this: “When you did this… “

I enjoyed this humorous, tough-talk parenting book, which was sent to me via the Parent Bloggers Network, much more than I thought I would. I’ve found myself picking up the book, time and time again, just to hear Rose talk, like a good, old, wise friend. And especially for this advice for the cookie jar:

The cookie jar should be kept at a kid-appropriate level so they can get at them when the time is right. Our cookie jar was not forbidden; it was no big deal. When we said to go ahead and have a few cookies, that’s exactly what they did. No one had to sneak.

What a difference, maybe it would have been for Roxanne, if her Mother had taken the same stance with boys, and not just the cookies. So, what happened to Roxanne? The romance faded, but not until it had done considerable damage to Roxanne’s habits and her reputation. Years later, when Roxanne’s Mom would pass my Mom on the street, she’d stop her and say, “My daughter was at your house that night,and you didn’t know it.” This used to really tick my Mom off.

Filed under: book, kids, parenting, products, self-help, teen by SusieJ - 7 Comments →

My oldest son was about five when I discovered that it might, perhaps, be a bit fruitless to stop him from making embarrassing noises with his mouth, and  to use the word “toilet” followed by a giggle. I also got a tip from a well-loved preschool teacher that this was in fact, “How boys learn about language. They find this arena of of the human body utterly  fascinating.”

So, I reluctantly let it go… but gently reining them in whenever we were in public places, or around other adults, so as not to offend them.

Alan Katz, has brilliantly used this well-known boy fascination to create a book of poems, specifically targeted to reach a young boy’s inner “grossness.” His books is called Oops!, illustrated by Edward Koren. If you’re a Mom, you will not like this book. Your son will love it. Better yet, as your son sits on the sofa reading the book aloud to his brothers, you will be pleasantly pleased.

Filed under: book, products, teen by SusieJ - 1 Comment →

A boy, we’ll call him Calvin, asked my son to carry his backpack for him, after an injury left him on crutches. I was proud. My son is kind, thoughtful.. and just an all-around nice guy.

Calvin had been in my son’s life in 1st and 2nd grades, but the the friendship had grown apart over the last three years, as my son’s interest evolved into sports, and Calvin’s didn’t.

Over the next couple of days, I began to notice the little snippets tacked on to the end of my son’s stories that revealed how much of Calvin’s incapacitation was influencing my son’s school day. It wasn’t just that Calvin insisted on walking the long way around the gym, making my son miss the regular group of guys he normally walks home with, there were other things. My son carried Calvin’s lunch tray, which moved my son to an entirely different “lunch table,” where the conversation introduced words to his vocabulary that made my ears burn. (He did share these new words with me as a “what do you think about this” conversation.) My son was no longer sitting with his regular group of friends.

Then, I heard about the funny trick Calvin played on my son.

“He left his binder, pencils and papers on his desk, and said I had to put all his stuff away for him.” Calvin’s hands and arms are fine — his leg is injured, I thought. “While I was stuffing his stuff in his backpack, Calvin left and went to the elevator, pushed the button, and left without me. So I had to carry his backpack, plus my backpack, all the way down the stairs. Calvin just laughed.”

Tell me more, I said. “Well, he calls me his slave… but he’s just kidding,” he said.”And, he snaps his fingers, and tells me to hurry up.” He added, “actually, he can’t ‘snap’ his fingers… he just pretends.”

Soon, my husband, overhearing the words from the other room, joined the conversation with, “He DOES WHAT!” Soon, our other son, joined the room, peppering the conversation his his version of “Why didn’t you just…”My son continued, “He forgot his lunch money on Friday, so I paid for his lunch,”

Did he pay you back?

“Well, he said he would… but then he forgot his money again, so I bought his lunch for him again today.”

At this point my husband and I are, in a word, steaming with anger. Calling his parents would have sent the wrong message: “We don’t think you can handle this on your own.” Besides, this incident was actually an opportunity, that laid the foundation for some growth. I had just finished reading Your Child’s Strengths: Discover Them, Develop Them, Use Them by Jenifer Fox, the night before, and we were already working on a “strengths chart” for each one of the boys. (The book outlines a how-to format for all ages, including the pre-school set. ) Your child’s strengths are not the acts that you observe in your child, the ones that warm your heart and then you spoon feed them to your child and pat them on the back, while you say, “This is what your strengths are dear,” as you tick them off the chart. No, Fox says, “Your child needs to come to a (strengths) epiphany on his own. You can lead him with your questions, but you cannot have it for him. Your job is to direct your child’s attention.” Chores, by the way create the perfect opportunity for your child to figure out what his strengths are, according to the book.

Fox says it is important to resist giving advice to your children… they will miss that internal shift that will make have the big impacts on minds. Rather, we need to teach our kids to accept responsibility, and “to see where he may have used his strengths to make poor decisions.” With no children of her own, Fox draws on her vast 25 years of experience as an administrator and teacher in both inner-city public and posh private schools. It’s tough to write a parenting book, when you’re not a parent… I found myself wincing at some of her advice. Yet, I knew what she had to say in this book was on-target, honed after her years of handling the toughest kids.

Right now, I needed my son to know, deep within, that Calvin was being disrespectful, and that Calvin, was in fact, a bully. As parents, as protectors, we just wanted to spit out the words, “You are not going to help Calvin anymore. You’re done. Calvin is taking advantage of you, and we won’t allow it.” We couldn’t do that. Yet, that’s exactly what we did. But, we were wrong; this was something I knew, especially after reading Strength’s. Yet, when your child needs help, sometimes you can’t help but try to rescue the one you love.

With or without Fox’s book to guide me, I knew I was wrong just by looking into my son’s eyes while I dictated advice to him, I could tell he didn’t “buy” what I was saying. “He’s just trying to be funny, Mom.” He felt uneasy about confronting this kid… he wasn’t convinced; in his mind, he wasn’t being bullied — although he did mention the word, on his own, earlier in the conversation.

I knew that once my son believed Calvin was wrong, the words, the motivation he needed to stand up to Calvin, would come to my son, all on its own. First, my son needed to believe it was right for him to say them.

Although we missed it on our first go-around in our strengths pow-wow with him, one of my son’s strongest strengths is that he is just a nice guy. He’s kind, and wants to help. He kept saying, “Mom, you told me how nice it is of me to help Calvin… and I couldn’t let him go without food at lunch time.” Deep down inside, my son wondered, “If I don’t help Calvin, who will?” Now, he needed to see how this strength was getting him into trouble. I didn’t want him to leave this thinking that it’s not a good idea to be nice to people.

This was a tricky situation, and it would take time, Fox warned, for this epiphany to occur. “Children’s innate strengths are like live wires connecting their unique inner qualities to their promise as adults. … when the energy is turned up and strengths are developed to their fullest, people’s passions light up. Life becomes meaningful and enjoyable even in the face of conflict, she wrote.

I began to ask my son how he felt when Calvin called him a slave, or how he felt when he left him at the elevator. I got nowhere. “I know he’s just kidding Mom… he laughs when he says it.” Doesn’t it bother you that you can’t sit with your regular friends? Nothing bothered him. His belief was still, “If I don’t help Calvin, who will?”

Exasperated, and trying very hard not to show it, I finally asked him; “Is there ANYTHING about helping Calvin that hurts you?” He said, well, yeah, “it makes my back and my neck hurt to carry both of these backpacks all day.” This was good, I thought. Physical pain is real, and he can identify with that. My son is, unfortunately, no stranger to neck pain. The weight in the backpacks they carry in middle school are close cousins to ball and chains, and they were already, before this incident, taking their toll. He had spent a few hours with ice and heat on his neck with pain.

“So,” I said. “Think about that pain, and now can you tell Calvin you can’t help him anymore because it hurts your neck?”

He looked away — almost as if he could no longer hear me, and he started to talk, “You know… yesterday, when I bent over to pick up his backpack, he left it unzipped, and didn’t tell me, so everything fell out and I had to pick everything up for him.” (Again, what is wrong with this kid’s hands?!)

What were you thinking?

“I thought, why does he need my help… I mean, Larry has crutches and nobody helps him carry his stuff. Why does Calvin need my help anyway?

Finally, I could see that my son had tapped into his on vein that got him thinking and processing information. The crucial step that Your Child’s Strengths claims is so necessary to helping our children develop their own self-esteem. My son began to see, and talk about, how helping Calvin was affecting his own life. Then, of course, I couldn’t stop him, which was great, even though it was after his bedtime. He talked about how the other kids were no longer laughing at Calvin’s jokes, and how people just don’t seem to like hanging around with him anymore.”

Update:

The subject of what my son would do was forefront in my mind all day long. When I finally saw him at the end of the day, he told me, as if it was no big deal, that he told Calvin he couldn’t help him anymore. Why, Calvin asked. “Because it hurts my back.” Calvin’s response was, “Come on, I carry it … you can do it… stop being such a wimp.” But the subject was dropped, and my son saw him later, with some other kid helping him.

Later, my son told me that he couldn’t say no to Calvin at first… he ended up helping him the morning, and then told him no. “So, what did you think about to give you the courage to speak up?” “Nothing,” he said. I was hoping for more “Epiphanies” but they didn’t come. So, you’re done, I asked? “Yep. I’m done.” It was no big deal, and I ate with my old friends.”

Although I am satisfied with the way this turned out, I wish I had refrained more from lecturing and giving advice. I wish I hadn’t given him the ideas… I wish I had been more patient and let him come to this discovery about how being Mr. Nice guy had turned sour, all on his own. It could have taken days, instead of hours. And it should have. Next time, I will try to do a better job, and show more restraint.. and do more directing, so that my children can discover these truths on their own. It was very hard for me not to “rescue.” Your Child’s Strengths is a work that’s under construction.

This review was written for the Parent Bloggers Network.

Filed under: book, self-help, teen by SusieJ - 10 Comments →